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Or… How the Glenn Beier photo gallery
came to be… |
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Today
when reading through stories from the men who knew John so well, I wondered
if any of them were approached about the future of their collections or
correspondence or perhaps, if I am lucky, any personal photographs taken
during the time they were part of this famous layout. John's
story is fascinating in many ways and a book about John's personal history
(as well as it can be told now) is long overdue. These verbal histories are treasures that
are about to be gone for good. Time is
simply the perfect enemy of all historians who race to collect what knowledge
that can be found from the generations before us. It can be especially difficult to find the
history and preserve items that have a more specialised
following such as any famous model railroader's items might as grieving
families do not contact museums to inquire about model railroading items,
especially old letters or photographs or some small box of fellow model
railroaders passes. Many families
simply know nothing of their dad's time in this hobby that may have been
enjoyed many years before some were even born. So
here we are now, in the third decade of a new century and I am finding that
(even this late in my searching) I am only but a few months behind in
salvaging the contents of boxes full of letters and photos from John. It is not uncommon to find family members
who are unsure of what to do with items like these. So boxes of
correspondence and old photographs are still being sent to the curb after the
old model trains and perhaps some collectable builder’s plates are sold. For this very reason these incidences have
more or less lit a fire under me to check out as many leads as I can. Glenn
Beier's widow Naomi was a pleasant and interesting
person. She did realize there must be
some interest in her husband's things and she was glad that I contacted her
about the John Allen items. I
discovered that she had a small but well preserved set of medium format
negatives and various correspondence with John Allen and of course the
original 16MM footage that Glenn himself shot with John, used to make the
Sunday River Productions movie. I had
a bit of sticker shock but I knew the film had to be brought into this group
at all costs. I was excited to find
this collection and was able to purchase all of it. I contacted Jeff Witt for some financial
help and asked if he would purchase the film itself from me. Jeff helped make this fantastic acquisition
possible with an enthusiastic yes indeed!
The film is in his capable hands and has been digitally preserved for
the future. The
images you see on these pages are my contribution to this fantastic internet
history project. And I must say I am
proud to now be a small part of this incredible, long standing, historic
preservation effort for John. I am
also hopeful that as time goes by and other collectors and fans of John Allen
who might find items (especially photographs) will do the same. I hope they will share what they find,
right here, with everyone and continue on with this effort to tell John's
great story. |
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